Daily Prompt – Meddle

Meddling in parenting ? Why others meddle .

You know how it is : you walk along the street and your child throws a temper tantrum. People around you look at you and wonder if you are a good mother . You can simply see them judging you .

At that time there always is some person who just has to meddle in the way you parent your child . But are you not the person who knows what is best for your child ? What makes it so that others come to you with these tips ? Do they think that they can parent your child so much better than you can ?

Mothers and fathers in general find it very annoying when people start to meddle in parenting of their child , without being asked to do so .

I call them the hovercraft…They’re the parents who have to know everything that happens at school, have to know how their child feels at each point. They question everything—from the curriculum to what’s served in the cafeteria—and expect to have input on everything.

In the introduction I stated that people in the streets can meddle in parenting , but it can also be so that family members are constantly giving advice about how to handle your child . in many cases this is your mother , who already has experience with bringing up a child , who believes that there are certain things that you should do differently . After a while you might even start to feel insecure because of all this meddling . You start to doubt yourself as a mother and you are embarrassed as a mother when your child then throws a temper tantrum.

We all love our kids. We all want them to do well, to make friends, to enjoy school and their extracurricular activities. And, to be sure, much parental involvement is good—and necessary. Because of staff and budget cutbacks, most schools truly need parents’ help in areas such as fund-raising, reading enrichment, even stints in the lunchroom and on the playground.

Often you cannot stop others from meddling , but you can change the way you deal with this. Especially if you have your first child , it can be so that you feel very insecure and that this starts to affect your life . Also , your life has changed a lot and you might notice that this change is not always easy for you . You can experience stress , or even start crying randomly .

But these days, a few parents—educators put the number at about five percent—are taking the suggestion that they become active in their children’s schools to a new extreme.

When it comes to their kids’ lives, over-involved parents refuse to let the chips fall where they may. In fact, the chips often never even hit the ground.

And these folks can have a disturbingly large impact on everyone who touches their child’s life. “A teacher can spend so much time and energy responding to one or two parents that it takes away from the rest of the class.

The irony of over-involvement is that it often backfires and hurts the very person it’s meant to help: the child. “I see parents not wanting their youngster to experience failure on any level — even forgetting a library book.

But over-involved parents are actually depriving their children of independence and the ability to take care of themselves.” Beyond that, “most of these parents think they’re helping, but the kid feels he’s flawed, since he obviously needs so much direction and assistance.

If we’re being honest, we have to admit that we’ve all had our overbearing moments. But brace yourself for our Hall-of-Shame moms and dads, who really went beyond the call of duty